BOOK REVIEW

"Mariani likes to separate his heroes so that he can cut back and forth between them as they're getting simultaneously ambushed in equally picturesque locales. Nor is he averse to a high body count. Apart from the rumor that he was poisoned, though, don't expect to learn much about Mozart."

Mariani's debut is a globetrotting action fantasy with one eye fixed firmly on The Da Vinci Code and the other on Hollywood.
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BOOK REVIEW

"For libraries, Mariani's account can function further as a handy time-line of American gastronomy; and, not least, the 200 b&w photos to come promise a banquet for browsers."

In a brisk, chronological narrative, Mariani, Esquire's food and travel correspondent, surveys American eateries from menu-less Colonial taverns to Delmonico's opulent Paris-style restaurant in early 19th-century New York to Bern's, a garish and extravagant Tampa steakhouse that he calls ``the most remarkable [and] one of the most famous restaurants in the entire world.'' Mariani's straightforward history has little in common with another recent survey, the Sterns' wittier, more entertaining American Gourmet (p. 1004).
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BOOK REVIEW

"A solid thriller that leaves you thinking it could have been much better."

On the brink of suicide following his wife's death, one-time British special-forces operative Ben Hope is intent on putting his violent past behind him and studying religion at Oxford. But when a family friend's daughter, a renowned biblical archaeologist, goes missing in Greece—and the young friend Ben sent to find her is killed in a bombing—Ben is forced to dust off his killing skills and spring back into action.
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BLOG POST

We live our lives mostly in the moment, but also attendant to the question of what if?— what if we had lived in that town rather than the one I know? what if my father (or mother) had died? what if my parents had divorced? what if I had attended school X rather than school Y? what if I ...

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Readers who know Pamela Paul’s books before she became the editor of the New York Times Book Review know that they are serious works of nonfiction: The Starter Marriage and the Future of Matrimony (2002), Pornified: How Pornography Is Damaging Our Lives, Our Relationships, and Our Families (2005), and Parenting, Inc.: How the Billion-Dollar Baby Business Has Changed the Way ...

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If Benjamin Franklin were alive today, he'd say that nothing in the world is certain except death, taxes, and Sherlock Holmes stories. Sherlock Holmes, the iconic consulting detective created by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle in 1887, is a perennial mainstay in the literary world. What's not to like? Holmes' methods of investigation and deductions are flawless and the ...

In this gem of an early reader, a cast of cavorting canines find more than they expected when they start digging—namely a scary bear, buried treasure, pirate ghosts and heavy construction equipment.
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